The Entrepreneur's Source Blog

Entrepreneur.com’s recent article titled “Would You Make a Good Franchisee?” highlighted The Entrepreneur’s Source Terry Powell, founder of E-Source. The article featured video footage of Terry Powell from the International Franchise Expo speaking about the high success rate of franchise business models and using franchises as a “vehicle to drive the results that you want.” The remainder of the video walks the viewer through important things for entrepreneurs to remember when deciding if the franchising industry is right for them.

The video portion of the feature was also accompanied by a written story, featuring Terry Powell, as well, that outlined some of the key characteristics of a great franchisee.

“Not all of us are wired to be franchisees,” The Entrepreneur’s Source Terry Powell said. “Franchises have guardrails that you operate within.”

Operating outside of these guardrails can sometimes lead to failure because the reasoning behind joining a franchise brand is to become part of and buy into a proven system. With the right opportunity, franchisees are able to find a rewarding and profitable career.

To read more of this article or watch the video footage, visit the Entrepreneur article here.

Franchise Friday hose Brendan Major was joined by The Entrepreneur’s Source and AdviCoach franchise owner Susan Strong. In this podcast, Susan addressed some of the skills that she has acquired during her past work experiences in corporate human resources and how they have helped her clients succeed.

About The Entrepreneur’s Source Franchise Owner Susan Strong

Susan invested in her first franchise almost five years ago. Before becoming a franchisee, Susan worked for over 20 years with Fortune 500, growth and start-up companies as a Senior Human Resources professional. Among the more well-established companies Susan worked for included Merrill Lynch, Wells Fargo Bank and Pacific Gas & Electric.

During her time as a Senior Human Recourses professional, Susan coached executives in all areas that revolved around business development and creating a successful team environment. Throughout her human resources career, Susan coached thousands of employees and helped them to set career goals and identify long-term career paths so they could excel.

Today, Susan is a happy franchisee and utilizes her past experiences as a human resources professional in coaching entrepreneurs.

Q: What are some of the qualities that you need to have to start your own business and how do you match those two things up?

A: I think one of the biggest things that you really need to be able to do is look at yourself and look at what your goals are and really put them down on paper. Start thinking through what you want your life to look like. Many of the people who I work with have been either downsized, in some cases have been fired, they retired or they are just plain burnt out. If they don’t take control of their destiny, chances are somebody else will. It’s really important to understand what a client has done in the past, workwise, and what they’ve been good at. These transferrable skills and their past likes and dislikes are extremely important to identify.

Q: Are there any tools or strategies that you use from your past corporate HR work in your coaching sessions?

A: One of the tools that I used in the corporate setting and continue to use with all of my clients is called DiSC, a personality assessment. I’ve used them over and over and found this to be a test that resonates with most people and they are able to take what they’ve learned and apply it in real time. Understanding someone’s style tells me how they might show up to meetings, how to coach them through perhaps their blind spots. It helps me to understand how they will look at information.

In DiSC, the:

D is for dominance

I is for influence

S is for steadiness

C is for consciousness

Generally, each individual has a course style that resonates with himself or herself. For example, what I find, the D personality, these are generally people that are very direct. They generally have been in control of the other businesses in the past. I have found that they sometimes are very excited, very enthusiastic, but go from A to Z during a process and get bored fairly quickly and don’t wanted to do the deep dive and really think about what’s important in a business.

Q: Tell me about what in your past, in your corporate experience helped you in your entrepreneurial experience.

A: My role as an AdviCoach career coach was to help employees uncover what they were meant to do and find a career direction and discover what direction they wanted to go in. Once they discovered that, we started looking at the possibilities in the company and identifying a career that would allow them to make good use of their talents. Then, we would start to think of a development plan for what they need to do to be able to put themselves in the best possible position to get the job. If done right, they begin a life long journey involving a lot of change in growth and development and reinvention.

In my franchise, I wanted to build something beyond being just an HR consultant, but really being able to offer clients a more rounded variety of expertise. Really looking at coaching my clients as opposed to just consulting and giving answers is what really attracts me. I see the difference between the consultant and a coach is a coach really ask question versus providing the answers, you need to be a strong listener, an observer, building trust is critical.

Q: What’s the biggest takeaway you can offer our listeners today?

A: As an AdviCoach coach, the most important thing you can be is an active listener and really hear what your client is saying. It’s really about gathering as much information as possible. You do start to create a story in your mind about who this person is and what businesses would be a great fit for them. It’s really about constantly keeping your ears open to what they are saying.

Find out what their goals, needs and expectations are and really talk about that constantly and go back to those every time you meet with them to make sure that you’re on the right track. Ultimately, this is a huge decision for their life and it’s important to me that they feel really comfortable and the lead that they are making.

There are certain businesses that are just not a good fit for all individuals depending on their characteristics. Really, diving into they’re back around. What they’ve done in the past, what they are good at, what they don’t like and how they see they want to spend their future. It’s critical to going from a corporate job into business ownership.

For more information about how you can join the entrepreneurial world, consulting with an E-source Coach is a great way to help you explore business opportunities.

Don’t forget to tune in to Franchise Friday every Friday at 10 a.m. EDT to learn more about small business ownership, franchising and entrepreneurship.

Scott Griffiths, 18|8 Hair Salons Co-Founder, was recently highlighted in the “Entrepreneurs” section of Forbes. Like any entrepreneur, Scott has had his setbacks. However, he has learned from his mistakes and failures and these have only pushed him harder and caused him to continue his education in entrepreneurship.

After spending 10 years developing the 18|8 business concept and refining his franchise model, in 2013 he made a goal to sell 30 franchises. He exceeded even his own expectations by selling double his goal.

The Entrepreneur’s Source and Franchise Investors Group (FIG), a division of ZorSource, has worked with 18|8 for the past year and has experienced exceptional success. To date, The Entrepreneur’s Source has brought 18|8 many multi-unit developer franchisees. During the last 12 months the total commitment by single and multi-unit new franchisees has resulted in more than 200 units.

A growing number of Baby Boomer parents and their recent college graduate children are pairing up and entering the franchise world together. “Family franchises” offer easy-to-follow systems and combines the many benefits of business ownership with a brand name, experience, proven operating system, and ongoing guidance and support provided by an established franchisor.

State of the Current Job Market

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average length of unemployment for people age 55 has continued to rise for the past year. Meanwhile, a recent analysis by The Associated Press found that 53.6 percent of those with bachelor’s degrees under age 25 were jobless or underemployed. The high unemployment rate of college graduates paired with the unwelcoming job market amongst Baby Boomers are just some of the factors that are driving these two unlikely demographics into business together.

The Entrepreneur’s Source Terry Powell on this Trend

Terry Powell, CEO and founder of The Entrepreneur’s Source, the nation’s leading career and franchise business coaching network, has seen this trend unfold.

“A vast majority of today’s unemployed baby boomers are seasoned executives with severance packages who are now looking for new ways to invest in their future. This trend, coupled with a bleak job market for today’s college graduates, has led more and more parents to partner with their children and invest in themselves by opening a franchise,” Powell said.

Franchising is a rewarding vehicle to entrepreneurship for parent-child partners because of its reliance upon accredited and proven systems. Franchising allows for parents and children to utilize easy-to-follow systems, a proven operating system, a recognized brand name and continual support by franchisors.

Parent-child teams don’t necessarily need to be a 50-50 combination. One of the business partners can hold more responsibility than the other to help avoid clashes. However, it is important that the parent-child pair finds the right concept that enables both business partners to utilize their best skills and former knowledge.

“Finding a franchise concept that allows everyone to leverage their skill set is imperative when identifying the right opportunity for a multigenerational partnership. Even if the parent isn’t fully engrained in the business – leaving their child to run the operations – they should still have an interest in the concept and be able to utilize their experience or skills to provide support,” Powell added. “When everyone is active in the business, we often find the parents handling jobs that require local connections while the children take care of day-to-day operations and online marketing.”

If you’re a parent looking to team up with your child or vice versa and want more information about this venture, contact an Entrepreneur’s Source business coaches to help to see if this practice falls within your realm.

The best franchises are founded upon scaling and replicating winning and effective business processes. In the corporate sector, a similar idea is often called the “Six Sigma” model.

The Entrepreneur’s Source franchise Explains Six Sigma?

Many corporations utilize the “Six Sigma” model in order to improve the capability of their business procedures. Six Sigma is most commonly characterized by a decrease in process variation and an increase in personal performance. This increase in performance and decrease in variation typically yields a standardized method of procedures, eliminating confusion and disparities among products and people. Within the corporate sector, this model leads to an improvement in profits, employee morale and quality of services.

Six Sigma Success with Sir Grout Franchising

Coming from the corporate sector, Tom Lindberg is a Black Belt Sigma, the highest of the six ranks of the Six Sigma model, and has incorporated this corporate model into his franchise business. Tom, president and co-founder of Sir Grout Franchise, began his career in the corporate sector where he first learned Six Sigma, and has since utilized his knowledge of this model to improve the efficiency and procedures within his business.

“Those set of tools (Six Sigma) really worked well for us and, essentially, and you’ve probably heard this before, it centers around great people, great processes and great price,” he said. “Great people do great things, but better than that, if you have a set of processes that consistently deliver great customer results, even people that are not so great can still be successful because the processes are so strong.”

Incorporating the Six Sigma model into his franchise has allowed for fewer inconsistencies between his franchises, allowing for a unified final product and a satisfied customer base. This model increases efficiency because it eliminates these disparities, and the end result has allowed for more time to give back to the consumer.

“We really focus on great people, great processes and then, of course, you have to have great tools and products that they can use to execute,” Tom said. “My mantra is ‘Win with Winners,’ and that can be winning processes, winning products and winning people.”

For more information about how this model can potentially increase the efficiency in a franchise, contact a business coach at The Entrepreneur’s Source franchise.

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Creating a self-employment opportunities is not easy, and it is quite scary, especially for some of us who have enjoyed cushioned jobs, good pay and great benefits. After I lost my job during company layoffs, I had attended business startup and franchise presentations led by a coach from The Entrepreneur Source. He provided a wealth of information and resources, but more important, real data and examples from his own experience as a franchise owner. (more…)

Goran Markinovic

“After twenty+ years working in corporate Human Resource roles across multiple geographies I woke one morning feeling that I was no longer revved up to continue in the same rat race that I had chased for the last twenty something years. I had to find something more rewarding, more challenging, more engaging and more provocative than the day to day grind. I wanted to own my business but I didn’t know where to start. (more…)

Jonathan Jenswold

I first met my coach when I was in transition after a long corporate career and considering the start of my own business. Throughout the process of considering a franchise he was always encouraging, thoughtful, thorough and patient. He does keep the process moving forward, has a good sense of urgency, and even keeps things light with a great sense of humor.

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For over 30 years The Entrepreneur’s Source has provided thousands of people with the answers and the opportunities they needed to improve their lives. Our discovery and education-based method of franchise and business coaching allows our clients to discover....Read More